Chapter 449 - 430: Let’s Just Find a Simpler Task...
「The west wing of the Spirit Beast Garden, in the maternity ward.」
A Clouded Leopard lay on a soft cushion woven from Spirit Grass, her spotted coat seeming to ripple in the light.
A few newborn cubs snuggled under her belly, nursing with their eyes shut.
Today was another day of waiting for "postpartum care."
She remembered the humans who used to come here. They all had hollow eyes and stiff limbs. Their hands never trembled when they fed her cubs. Their movements were strange, but at least they were quiet and obedient.
But one day, an ignorant companion had hissed at the group of puppets. Seeing how obedient they were, it had even opened its great maw, intending to have an extra meal.
The next second, the puppets had suddenly sprung to life and chopped that companion into mincemeat.
From that day on, the Clouded Leopard understood.
In this sect, any beast that dared to snack on a human would suffer a gruesome death.
Then, a series of footsteps approached.
The Clouded Leopard stared straight ahead.
A few people dressed in Guixi Sect disciple robes walked in. Unlike the puppets from before, their eyes darted about and their steps were unsteady. If the previous group had been soulless marionettes, then this new bunch were living, breathing humans brimming with ill intent.
The Clouded Leopard's muscles tensed instinctively as she nudged the cubs in her embrace further behind her.
Suddenly!
The group of "geniuses" stopped in unison about three feet away from her!
Without any warning, they deftly pulled a mahogany table from their storage bags, set it up, and placed an incense burner on top.
A flint sparked, and smoke began to curl from three sticks of incense.
"Miss Leopard, we honor you! Please accept our respects!"
The one in the lead yelled at the top of his lungs, his voice filled with passion.
"By order of the sect, we have come to provide you with postpartum care! May you enjoy eternal blessings and a life as long as the heavens!"
The Clouded Leopard's eyes widened, her mouth falling slightly open to reveal the tip of her tongue.
'Wait, what is this... Are they trying to get themselves killed?'
Before she could even react, the men had already completed their grand ceremony of paying respects to a sect spirit beast.
One of them stood up and, with a solemn expression, brought out a bundle of bright yellow material from his storage bag.
As the material was unfurled, the Clouded Leopard finally saw what it was.
It was a cotton quilt, on which several long, slithering creatures—probably dragons—were crudely embroidered with crooked gold thread.
"Miss Leopard! The mountain winds have grown chilly of late, and we fear for your noble health! We have specially procured this 'imperial robe' to drape over you and ward off the cold!" The disciple held the quilt high above his head with both hands.
'Did the sect's observers see that? Did they see my loyalty to the sect? I'm symbolically draping an imperial robe over the Guixi Sect itself!'
'We're not just taking care of a spirit beast; we're helping the sect ascend to the pinnacle of the Cultivation Realm! If Miss Su or the observers see this kind of high-level, symbolic maneuver, they'll surely be moved by our sincerity!'
The Clouded Leopard was dumbfounded.
'What on earth are you doing?'
She watched, wide-eyed, as the group of men swarmed her and clumsily wrapped the yellow quilt around her body.
To keep the quilt from slipping off, they even thoughtfully tied it in a knot.
In the blink of an eye, the Clouded Leopard was wrapped up like a bright yellow rice dumpling, with only her furry head and two utterly bewildered eyes sticking out.
The cubs in her embrace sensed something was wrong with their mother. They poked their little heads out and stared in confusion at the strange two-legged beasts.
'Are you people... completely brain-damaged?'
"Marvelous!"
One of the geniuses took two steps back, admiring his masterpiece.
"Miss Leopard is truly magnificent! This robe only enhances her divine majesty!"
"Of course! Just consider Miss Leopard's status! How could the Clouded Leopard of our sect be compared to those common, wild ones out in the mountains?"
"Those wild leopards have messy coats, fierce glares, and stink of dirt! Compared to our sect's Miss Leopard, the difference is like night and day!"
"What does Miss Leopard have? It's called nobility! The natural air of a superior being!"
The more the undercover agents spoke, the more excited they became. They pulled out all the stops with their flattery, elevating the "noble" Miss Leopard by bad-mouthing others, all to prove their unparalleled loyalty to the Guixi Sect.
However, as these "compliments" reached her ears, the Clouded Leopard's pupils constricted.
'Messy coats?'
She glanced down at the pattern of her own fur.
'Fierce glares?'
She felt a strong urge to show them just how fierce she could be.
'Did this group of people come here just to humiliate me?'
'They're being passive-aggressive! Insulting me indirectly!'
'Where are the puppet disciples from before?! Can someone please get rid of this brain-damaged bunch and bring the old ones back?!'
Under the quilt, every hair on the Clouded Leopard's body stood on end.
'Could this be the legendary humiliation before the final meal? First, you belittle your prey until it's worthless, and then you turn it into fertilizer with a clear conscience?'
Just as she was debating whether to fight for her life, more hurried footsteps approached.
A few more undercover agents came running in from outside.
In pairs, they carried large wooden basins.
"Miss Leopard! Your meal has arrived!"
The basin was placed on the ground, and a sour, rancid odor instantly filled the maternity ward.
The stench assaulted her senses, and the Clouded Leopard couldn't help but stare.
The basin seemed to be filled with a grayish-green sludge, its surface churning with countless bubbles that popped intermittently.
This was the fruit of the agents' "treasure hunt" in the Dining Pavilion.
'If we're going to show "love," we can't just feed her ordinary meat. How else would we demonstrate the difference between a demonic sect and a regular one?'
They'd personally witnessed the power of the Abyssal Squirming Brain. They figured that the more a food looked like it would kill you, the more of a delicacy it must be in the Guixi Sect!
Since they were penniless, their only option was to frantically scavenge for this "delicacy" in the free section. It wasn't as if they hadn't tried it themselves; besides smelling disgusting, it was actually edible.
"Miss Leopard! Please, eat!"
One of the agents lifted the basin and, grinning from ear to ear, brought it to the Clouded Leopard's mouth. He even produced a spoon and tried to feed the cubs first.
"This is a celestial delicacy we painstakingly selected for you. It's incredibly nourishing!"
Before the spoon could even touch a cub, the Clouded Leopard's patience finally snapped.
'Poison!'
'This has to be poison!'
'It wasn't enough for these two-legged beasts to humiliate me, now they want to poison my children!'
"ROAR—!"
The Clouded Leopard roared, suddenly wrenching her front paws free from the "imperial robe" and swiping!
"BAM!"
The wooden basin instantly shattered under the immense force, splinters flying everywhere.
The agent holding the basin felt a massive force slam into him, sending him sprawling to the ground.
And the basin of grayish-green sludge flew through the air in a perfect arc, heading straight down.
Right onto the Clouded Leopard below!
SPLAT—!
The Clouded Leopard's vision went dark as the liquid slid down her face, sealing her eyes shut and clogging her nose.
To make matters worse, she had been roaring just a moment ago, leaving her mouth wide open.
The sludge poured straight down her throat, "rewarding" her with a huge mouthful.
In that moment, the Clouded Leopard thought she saw her great-grandma.
A bizarre taste flooded her taste buds, but it was immediately followed by a warm current rising from her stomach—the medicinal effect of one of the Spirit Grasses in the mix.
It was nourishing, she supposed, but not by much.
But mixed in was an earthy herb she absolutely detested, which made the concoction taste utterly foul!
The Clouded Leopard felt the world spin as her stomach churned violently. The nauseating sensation almost made her vomit everything right then and there.
'What the hell is this new form of torture?! What kind of sick new torment has the sect come up with now? Can someone please bring the puppets back?!'
Seeing this, the agent who had fallen to the ground suddenly understood everything!
"Look!" he pointed at the sludge-covered Clouded Leopard, his voice trembling. "Miss Leopard... To hog this celestial delicacy for herself, she was willing to steal it from her own cubs and even strike us!"
The other geniuses were stunned for a moment before they, too, had a sudden epiphany.
"So that's how she wanted to get the food into her mouth!"
"I get it! Miss Leopard was showing us just how much she craved this food! She didn't even want to share it with her cubs; she wanted it all for herself!"
"We were too foolish! We should have prepared more for you! Please forgive our oversight, Miss Leopard!"
"Miss Leopard, there's plenty! Don't you worry!"
"We have more! It's all for you!"
"Miss Leopard is a true beast of passion! Such greed! A true role model for the demonic path! Our hearts are filled with yearning!"
As they spoke, they took out more incense and bowed three more times to the Clouded Leopard.
Peering at the two-legged beasts through the goo covering her eyes, the Clouded Leopard felt she was going insane.
'These people aren't just sick, they're terminally ill!'
'And they want to torture me with more of that damned stuff?!'
'They want to force me to eat it?!'
"ROAR! ROAR! ROAR!"
Although she was afraid of the consequences and didn't dare to actually kill them, these bastards weren't going to escape a good thrashing!
"BAM! BAM! BAM! BAM!"
Afterimages flashed past as a series of dull thuds rang out.
The agents who had crowded around saw only a blur before their bodies were launched into the air, flying in a series of arcs.
Some slammed into the stone walls, one was left dangling from a roof beam, and another was swatted right out the main door of the maternity ward.
"My back!"
"Miss Leopard, calm down! Please, calm down!"
In an instant, the maternity ward was thrown into chaos, filled with wails of agony.
The group of geniuses lay sprawled on the ground, clutching their broken ribs and swollen faces, mired in self-doubt.
'How did it come to this?'
'We were so humble. We flattered her to the absolute limit. We even offered her a "celestial delicacy."'
'So why did we still get beaten up?'
'Could this be the "love" Miss Su was talking about?'
'This love is a little too intense!'
"HISS!!! HISS!!!!" The Clouded Leopard hissed at them menacingly.
"This bea—this beautiful spirit beast doesn't understand our painstaking efforts!"
"Retreat... Let's get out of here..."
The lead agent spit out a tooth and staggered to his feet.
They fled the maternity ward, leaving behind a total mess and a Clouded Leopard that was still frantically shaking her head.
They walked the path back to the Transmission Hall, their shadows cast long and desolate upon the ground by the setting sun.
It was a failure.
A complete and utter failure.
But this didn't crush their confidence as self-proclaimed "geniuses." They simply decided to lower the difficulty.
"Let's just find an easier mission..."
And at that very moment, a very simple and repeatable mission was waiting for them at the Transmission Hall: *Help Hatch New Life (Egg-Shaped Objects).*